In a few moments she was asleep!  For two days and nights she had hardly slept or eaten; and she had no idea of the effect this had had on her mind and body—­the child who till now had eaten and slept so regularly and peacefully in her quiet home.  How was it possible that she could understand anything at all of what had happened to her?  All that she had been able to give to her affectionate but melancholy parents out of her heart’s rich store of love, was a kind of watchful care; in her grandmother’s brighter home longings for something more had often come over her, but there was nothing even there to satisfy them.  So now when love’s full spring burst upon her, she stood amidst its rain of blossoms frightened and ashamed.

Tormented by her innocent conscience, the poor tired child had run a race with herself till she fell—­now she slept, caressed by the pure mountain breeze.

Beret had not gone home, but away to fetch Hans Haugen.  She had far to go, and most of the way was unknown to her.  It went first by the edge of a wood, and then higher over bare flats, not quite safe from wild animals, which she knew had been seen there lately.  But she went on, for Hans really must come.  If he did not, she was sure things would go badly with Mildrid; she seemed so changed to-day.

In spite of her anxiety about Mildrid, Beret’s heart was light, and she stepped merrily on, her thoughts running all the time on this wonderful adventure.  She could think of no one better or grander than Hans Haugen, and none but the very best was good enough for Mildrid.  There was nothing whatever to be surprised at in Mildrid’s giving herself up to him at once; just as little as in his at once falling in love with her.  If father and mother could not be brought to understand this, they must just be left to do as they chose, and the two must fight their own battle as her great-grandparents had done, and her grandparents too—­and she began to sing the old Bridal March.  Its joyful tones sounded far over the bare heights and seemed to die away among the clouds.

When she got right on the top of the hill she was crossing, she stood and shouted “Hurrah!” From here she could see only the last strip of cultivated land on the farther side of their valley; and on this side the upper margin of the forest, above it stretches of heather, and where she stood, nothing but boulders and flat rocks.  She flew from stone to stone in the light air.  She knew that Hans’s hut lay in the direction of the snow mountain whose top stood out above all the others, and presently she thought that she must be getting near it.  To get a better look around she climbed up on to an enormous stone, and from the top of it she saw a mountain lake just below.  Whether it was a rock or a hut she saw by the water’s edge she could not be sure; one minute it looked like a hut, the next like a big stone.  But she knew that his cabin lay by a mountain lake.  Yes, that must be it, for there came a boat rowing round the point.  Two men were in the boat—­they must be Hans and the German officer.  Down she jumped and off again.  But what had looked so near was really far off, and she ran and ran, excited by the thought of meeting Hans Haugen.